This section contains reviews of the
presentations at the meeting, links to blog entries
from Space
Transport News pictures and other resources
for the Space
Access Society's annual meeting - SA'06,
April 20-22, Phoenix, Arizona.

9:00 am: Steve Harrington
(Flometrics)...
Steve gave an overview of the various types of fluid
dynamics work that the company does in areas ranging
from aerospace to biomedical. They have been developing
a pistonless pump for several years that has performance
comparable to a turbopump but is far more reliable and
safe. Showed a local TV news clip about their pistonless
pump and the rocket work with students at Cal State
San Diego.

He reviewed the problems and failures that have
occurred in various turbopump projects over the years.

Reviewed the design of their pistonless pump.

Low cost yet performs as well as a turbopump.

"Failsafe operation."

Needs helium to drive it. Developing a liquid helium
system to provide gaseous helium to pressurize the
pump.

A dual pistonless pump prototype has got to 60gal/minute.

Looking for a vehicle to fly it on.

A turbopump subtracts from the rocket performance
since it extracts power to drive it. A detailed comparison
showed that a turbopump got 97.1% of ideal performance
vs. 98.7% for the pistonless pump.

Working with several companies such as Garvey Spacecraft.

Steve Harrington explains the intricacies of pumping
Margaritas
with the Flometrics pistonless
pump during an after hours gathering

What do investors look for: IP, how much control,
when can an investor get out, etc.

Dyson:

How willing are the founders of startup willing
to give up control?

Is the startup a toy or a child? A toy can be
held indefinitely while a child must be nurtured
but eventually set free.

Need to transfer from founder mode to manager
mode.

Q&A:

Investors need to fully understand and believe
in the customer base. The technology can't be
the only focus.

Tech development can be funded by angel investors
but not institutional ones.

An investment has a transaction cost - time
to investigate and do background studies, etc.
Small investments can require a big a transaction
cost as a big one. Can be easier to get $20M than
$20k. For small startup, find a friend or relative
who knows you.

Panel thinks at least one alt.space company
will be acquired in the next year.

Companies like Scaled Composites whose primary
assets are the founder's skill and vision are
very difficult to evaluate by outside investors.

Angel investors often want to diversify. Companies
should not try to keep their investor hidden.
In the long run it is better if they invest in
other companies in same area.

Venture investors expect to get up to 10x their
money. They usually don't get that but they need
to be convinced that it is possible.

IPO and a sale are the two exit modes. Can get
into a situation where one type of investors,
e.g. holders of preferred shares, benefit more
from a sale than an IPO, even when the latter
is best for the company.

Audience member suggestion: A prize approach
in which the purse leads to shares in the winning
company for the prize giving organization.

Make investors want to invest in the area and
then provide the justification.

Activist efforts pushed for the concentration
of commercial spaceflight regs in AST rather than
spread over several agencies

Formal vs informal rules

Human rating - Shuttle doesn't fulfill NASA's
human rating rules

ISS rendezvous rules

A federal commission (E.g. like the Challenger
and Columbia commissions) is required to investigate
the death of a space crew member even if the incident
occurred on a craft under contract to the government.
E.g. A death on a vehicle trying to win a Centennial
prize for orbital spaceflight could involve such
a commission.

Not in a barnstorming environment for spaceflight
due to a host of such legal and regulatory complications.

Randall Clague

Went through a long, long list of local, state,
and Federal agencies and departments that XCOR
has dealt with.

9:40 pm: Joe Carroll (Tether
Applications) ... Joe discussed the benefits
of private sponsorship of space related contests. He
had a good experience with a student contest involving
a demonstration of a tether payload catching mechanism.
Companies can use prizes to find good students and potential
employees.

He then began discussing DARPA's Falcon Program:
Small Launch Vehicle (SLV). It is managed by the
Air Force and he is the Program Chief Engineer for the
program. The objective is to demonstrate "affordable
and responsive space lift". Task 1 is the SLV,
task 2 is hypersonic technologies.

Began with 9 Phase 1 contracts, 4 Phase 2A, and now
2 SLV. SpaceX (which is paying for most of its own expenses)
plus Air Launch LLC. Air
Launch would fly in 2008 if Phase 2B approved.

Air Launch QuickReach rocket development completed
Phase 2A on time, on budget. This included engine tests,
stage separation test, ground drop test, C-17 drop test.
Self-pressurizing propellants (Propane), no secondary
pressurization system, no venting inside aircraft, single
engine each stage, thrust vector control (TVC). Drops
will eventually be done at 500ft/sec at 30k ft. Fires
after about 3 seconds.

Tests needed to prove practical implementation. There
were initial doubts about drops from C-17 but the tests
went very smoothly. Try to use as much off-the-shelf
technologies as possible.

9:50 am: Secretary Rick Homans
(New Mexico Economic Development)... Mr. Homans
discussed the New Mexico Spaceport. He promoted NM as
a space industry friendly area. Plans to attract entrepreneurial
space companies to NM go back several years. Involved
with Scaled and Virgin before X PRIZE was won. Early
on they decided to pursue the XP Cup very aggressively.

Environmental impact review and other regulatory processes
are moving along well. Looking for architectural and
construction firms that are aware of the significance
of the first purpose built commercial spaceport. Want
an impressive facility that inspires awe. Should attract
visitors who come just to tour the spaceport and not
just flight participants. Will work for both horizontal
and vertical launch systems. Initally manned horizontal
and small unmanned vertical.

The political and business communities in NM are strongly
behind the push to attract and nurture this industry.

11:00 am John Carmack (Armadillo
Aerospace)... John begins with review
of their development history. Here are miscellaneous
notes:

Philosophy is to build actual hardware, make multiple
versions to experiment and learn about them.

Experimented with pumps but don't think they are
needed for suborbital

Will use spherical tanks for the next generation
of vehicles

Fixed date for an event like the XP Cup is a good
motivator for getting things done.

Built an ablative engine for the XP Cup vehicle.

Did 20 flights before last year's Cup. Everything
looked very solid going into the event.

High winds led to the toppling after landing on
the first flight off the ground plate. This caused
a fuel leak that prevent a second flight. They learned
a lot in preparing the vehicle for the Cup.

Have applied for license for a larger vehicle. Not
complete.

New vehicle is a scaled up version of previous one.
Gimbeled engine. 100 gallon tank.

Test stand now uses same systems as on the vehicle.
Fully tests what will fly.

Film cooled engine. Little or no erosion.

Video of horizontal firings. 30 ft plumes.

Trying to talk rocket racing people to try vertical
drag racing as a side event.

Picture of intermediate test vehicle. Will go for
the lunar lander challenge at next XP CUp with it.

Showed cool video of a hold-down test this week
of a large vehicle. Tested gimbaling. No erosion in
long burn.

Graphic of large vehicle for high altitudes. Returning
to differential throttling. Engines on side and body.
Totally sealed body design. Could do water launch.
Aiming for Level 2 Centennial Challenge. Capable of
manned flights to 100km.

Expects to lose them during tested. Fairly inexpensive
to build. (~$30k)

Hopes to reach 100km by end of this year. Next year
lots of flight tests.

NM is a long drive. Hope to use private land near
home in Texas.

Orbital system feasible for $2M range.

TSTO, low performance first stage, high performance
second stage.

Currently focused on bi-propellant but thinking
of the possibilities of a monopropellant for a SSTO
vehicle. Something they will investigate and perhaps
build a test system.

Hope to get some commercial customers to fly payloads
to 100km this year to pay for development.

Since their construction costs are so low, only
a few flights needed to pay for a vehicle.

At system level, there is considerable overlap
between the orbital and suborbital vehicle development.

With a COTS contract they could fly by 2008.
First commercial flight in 2009.

Will try to develop K-1 even without COTS but
it will be delayed.

Suitable for Bigelow habitats / America's Space
Prize.

K-1 based lunar transport scheme shown from
several years ago. Used a heavy lift version of
the K-1 with a cluster of first stage boosters
for putting fuel and cargo into orbit.

Rick Tumlinson and Bill
Boland (Space
Frontier Foundation)... Rick and Bill
presented the Foundation's new Teachers
in Space project. The goal is to fly hundreds of
teachers to space every year. Will first try to raise
money from private sources.

Armadillo, Rocketplane, and XCOR have each agreed to
provide one free ride as their vehicles come on line.

2:00 pm Jeff Hamilton (MSFC
and Michoud Assembly Facility) - Jeff reviewed
MSFC and Michoud facilities and what's available for
companies to test their systems. Full cost accounting
has been dropped (i.e. don't have to pay the whole cost
of a wind tunnel to use it.) Space Act agreements require
up front payments. Trying to make the process more customer
friendly and useful.

2:50 pm
Jeff Greason (XCOR
Aerospace) - Jeff Greason reviewed
the status of the XCOR projects. (To show how he sees
the future, he briefly put on a pair of sunglasses.

Jeff was familiar with fluropolymers (related
to Teflon) from time at Intel and suggested trying
it for tanks.

Doesn't burn and doesn't suffer from micro-cracking.

Patent pending.

NASA materials R&D is being cut way back
so XCOR's project will probably also be cut.

Lots of interest for both aerospace and other
apps.

Need to go as far as capped tanks with internal
funding

Pumps - piston pump project. Will use a three cylinder
pump for the X-Racer engines.

LOX/Methane propulsion development started long
before NASA talked about using it for the CEV. When
NASA included it in the Exploration architecture,
they applied for the contract. Met most of the long
term requirements already with a working thruster
but still lost the contract to a company with only
paper designs. However, methane propulsion was dropped
from the architecture but it might be brought back.

EZ-Rocket - For the XP Cup it was brought out of
retirement and they got cost/flight down from $3000
to $900 and turnaround from 24 hour to 3 hour

X-Racer - first flights this year.

Pump-fed LOX/Kerosene. 1500lbf

10 minute turnaround

16-20 sortie/day.

~1.5 km/s delta-V

There will be 10 independent owner/operators

Need to work out warranty, insurance, support,
etc issues.

Will be a big deal as far as building up the
industry infrastructure

Xerus suborbital vehicle

Despite all the other projects, they still have
2-3 people working full time

At AST there have been several developments as well.
They worked, for example, on streamlining of environmental
impact reviews. Provide standard template documents
for horizontal and vertical launch vehicles. Ultimate
goal is to obtain a Categorical Exclusion for launch
vehicles, which would release launch vehicle developers
from the need to do environmental reviews. Need more
flight data to obtain that.

Human spaceflight rulemaking underway. Currently reviewing
public comments made on the proposed rules.

Experimental permit for RLV available. Used to fly
vehicle for R&D, showing compliance for license,
and crew training. Permits valid for one year. No "for
profit" or paid passenger services.

He expects several experimental permits this year,
an RLV license, and a new launch site operator license.
Also, he thinks there will be frequent, routine suborbital
passenger flights within 2-3 years.

4:45 pm Dave Masten (Masten
Space Systems) - Dave gave an update
of progress at MSS since last year.

Igniter development and tests went well last year

They then moved to start full engine development.

Showed videos of the tests, including a 45 second
firing.

Fully regenative cooled chamber.

LOX/Isopropyl Alcohol

XA-01 vehicle photo.

Hold down tests in couple of weeks.

Tether tests probably by June.

Cansats and small payloads.

350gram CanSat - $99

Expect to fly at XP Cup

4:55 pm Ian Kluft (Stratofox
Aerospace Tracking Team) - This team tracks
down high altitude rockets flown by amateur teams and
small companies. Experienced in particular with the
Black Rocket Desert but have also done, and will do,
searches in other areas.

Launch recoveries include:

CSXT 100km flight in 2004

Two AeroPAC To100K flights by Aero-PAC (Association
of Expt. Rocketry of the Pacific) that attempted to
reach 100K feet. Both had second stage problems. More
attempts planned for this summer.

8:10 pm Jerry
Pournelle - Jerry lays out his suggestions
for space development. "The quickest way to space"
is for Congress to pay $10B to the first company to
establish a lunar colony with at least 31 people and
"keep them there alive and well for 3 years and
1 day". No income tax would be paid on the prize.
He proposes $5B for a "space station continuously
occupied by 12 Americans for 3 years and one day".

Return to the X program model. A successful X program
should last about 4 years, no new technologies, three
vehicles (one to crash, one to test, and one to the
Smithsonian), and aim to "push the envelope".

Jerry recounted his involvement in the effort to start
the SSX
single stage to orbit vehicle. The DC-X became the prototype
for the SSX. This would have evolved into the DC-Y,
which would have gone to orbit or close to it.

9:00 pm Timothy Bendel (Frontier
Astronautics) - Timothy reports on what the
company has been up to during the past year. One project
came out of last year's meeting: they got a contract
to develop the attitude control system for the Masten
Space XA-01.

They are also working on the Viper
engine - pressure fed LOX/Kerosene, 7500 lbf thrust.
Can be cluster to reach 30k lbf thrust. Cheap, replaceable
ablative liner. Lack of testing facilities stalled development
for about 6 months. Moved to Wyoming to avoid problems
in Colorado and moved in a former Atlas missile silo!

Lots of great pictures of the silo facility. Lots of
possibilities for testing both vertical and horizontal
engines and vehicles using facilities on the grounds
as well. Will offer to lease the facility to private
space companies. Can obtain site waiver for 60 second
flights. Intend to apply for suborbital test license.
Talking to the state about support for a private spaceport.

Considering hydrogen peroxide production if there is
sufficient interest.

9:30 pm Reda Anderson -
first customer for the Rocketplane suborbital flight.
Considers herself an adventurer, not a tourist. First
found out about space flights when someone told her
about the SS1 flights, which she went to watch. Met
Chuck Lauer at the Space Frontier Foundation meeting
on the Queen Mary in 2004. Made a contract with him
right there. Has been all over the world. Took a submersible
to see the Titanic.

Wants safety but knows the risks. Wants lots of information
about the system and what the experience will be like.
Will try out simulators, training programs, etc. Wants
catering to family and friends who will share the experience
with her.

She will take a flower with her and release it in zero-g.
Then whenever she sees a similar flower she will re-live
the experience.

The essential benefit of the RLV is reliablity.
Every ELV is flying for the first time. Unreliablity
drives up the cost of spacecraft and operations.

Development cost of RLVs is higher but pay off in
the long run due to much higher reliability.

Over promotion of scramjets makes them into scamjets.
Despite the claims, scramjets are not require in the
effort to lower space access costs.

Most vehicles were built with government money and
so without regard to operational costs.

Russian launchers weigh about twice that of a comparable
US launcher. High cost of achieving low lift-off weight
is not worthwhile. A result of cost-plus contract
mentality.

4:00 pm: Larry Niven ...
Substituting for George Herbert, Larry spoke
about defenses against large meterorite impacts. He
and Jerry Pournelle wrote Lucifer's Hammer in
the 1970s about such a disaster. Comments:

NASA stole his one liner about how "the dinosaurs
didn't have a space program."

Large asteroid will pass earth in 2029. One in 50k
chance it will hit earth.

Review of various proposals for how to move or divert
an asteroid.

Tough to keep people worried about something over
a long period.

The ships in movies like Deep Impact or Armageddon
were far "too good" compared to what is
actually available.

4:50
pm: Andrew Turner (Space
Systems/Loral)...
Loral is proposing the Aquarius low cost unmanned
vehicle for bulk cargo delivery to the ISS. Features
of the Aquarius system include:

Philosophy is to use a cheap vehicle with low reliability
(~0.80)

Simple, low-margin design

Use to restock a depot with fuel, water, food, etc.
Not manned.

Flight termination reliability, on the other hand,
must be very high (0.999)

No stand-down after a failure - try to fix the problem
but just accept failures.

Water launch - minimum cost, avoids risk to launch
infrastructure

Dolphin in 1984 used a water launch

Baseline single stage to orbit vehicle with H2/LOX

Jacket around vehicle while in the water. Falls
away during launch

SSTO is 20% lower operating cost than TSTO and
development cost is less than 30% of TSTO

With high launch rates (~100 per year) then relative
cost comparison gets even better

Ready by 2010 if COTS funded

Need a space tug to bring supplies to ISS

Space tug will be qualified for ISS rendezvous

AF contract for study + Cal State grant

A slick video from 2002

$1-$2M per launch

1 ton payload

Taken to launch area via towed barge

Railroad train transport from plant to dock

Project Hydra - a Navy project

Partnered with Microcosm

The design includes a composite tank and some other
heritage items from Scorpius program

5:40 pm: Sam Dinkin (Space-Shot.com)...
Sam reviewed the Space
Shot game and the motivation behind it. He answered
lots of questions about the weather prediction aspects
of the game.

Sam also presented a check to Chuck Lauer of Rocketplane.
As part of their arrangement, Space-Shot would give
them the second half of their launch fee two weeks after
the public opening of the game.

8:00 pm: Leik Myrabo ...Leik
discussed his laser and microwave propulsion projects.
He discussed the nano-capsule they flew a few years
ago to 72m with a 10kW pulsed CO2 laser. He showed a
video from the Discover Channel plus some videos of
simulations of their lightcraft vehicles. He went through
the details of how the laser pulsed detonation engine
cycle works. He described the basic design of a BEP
(Beamed Energy Propulsion) microsat launcher system.

9:15 pm: Lee Valentine...
Lee, who is a director of the Space
Studies Institute, gave a brief background and status
report on SSI, which was founded by Gerard O'Neill.
Current priority project is a completely closed life
support system based on biological processes. Involves
a collaboration with a group at Cornell. Need to raise
about $3M to fund a three year demonstration project.

9:30 pm: Andrew Tubbiolo
(Pueblo Instruments) ... Builds imaging and sensor
systems for spacecraft and astronomical projects. Can
provide imaging systems for use in propulsion, vehicle
development, e.g. fast imaging of rocket tests. Looking
for business with the alt.space industry.

9:40 pm: Alex Bruccoleri
... Alex talked about two different topics:

Microwave Thermal Rocketry - work in a short
term project at CalTech with Kevin Parkin.

Use ground based array of microwave attenas
to create a beam to heat hydrogen on a vehicle
via a heat exchanger.

Project at CalTech studied the basics of the
heat exchanger

Successfully heated Mullite Rods over a 2inch
length

A 1MW Gyrotron could fly a model rocket. Such
a project would involve ~$1oM

$1B to develop an orbital system. Once basic
system working, can build incrementally to put
bigger payloads into orbit

Setting up a static test stand at a "Liberal
Arts Academic Institution" (Dartmouth) -
Alex told the tale of setting up a rocket test stand
as a summer project that lasted far beyond summer.
After overcoming ten months worth of bureaucratic
resistance, he succeeded in installing a stand that
could be used for engines up to 4000 lb thrust.